Vision and Success
The easy way to measure a charity organization is by the amount of money it raises. More difficult to rate is the amount of benefit it brings to its community.
By both measures, the Ventura County Community Foundation is a remarkable success.
The 12-year-old nonprofit organization announced last week that it has zoomed past its goal--set in 1994--of raising $40 million by the end of 2000. Instead it begins the new millennium with an endowment of $56 million, producing interest that benefits every resident of Ventura County through hundreds of grants each year.
Through the Ventura County Community Foundation, individuals or families can establish their own permanent endowment funds that generate income from interest and dividends. Revenue is distributed annually in the family’s name in the form of grants to various community groups. Families can stay involved and choose where the money goes each year or leave it up to the foundation.
In 1994, the organization oversaw 80 of these individual funds; now there are 276. Two of the larger funds are Women’s Legacy, which provides grants to projects benefiting women, and Destino 2000, which focuses on Latino needs. Each fund has raised $400,000 in endowments that spin off about $20,000 annually for grants.
Altogether, last year the Ventura County Community Foundation awarded $1.5 million in grants to groups engaged in everything from cleaning up the air to providing more computer access to poor children in Oxnard. One of the many beneficiaries is the Community Literacy Project, which operates a bookmobile that visits poorer neighborhoods. Others include the Boys & Girls Clubs and the Alliance for the Arts, which supports performances and exhibits at the Civic Arts Plaza in Thousand Oaks.
About 40 scholarships, ranging from $500 to $2,000, go to Ventura County high school students each year. A grant by the foundation also created a directory of college scholarships available.
The group began in 1988 with a $50,000 endowment from the Teague family, longtime farmers and ranchers in Ventura County. Alan Teague personally called the nine other original board members to ask them to participate, board member Joe Brown told The Times. Most of them were active in the United Way at the time.
The original 10 board members will be recognized next month at a ceremony in Camarillo.
“This foundation would not exist if it were not for those 10 people,” Kate McLean, the group’s executive director, told The Times. “They literally wrote checks from their pockets to pay for lights and rent.”
We add our congratulations and thanks to those who first envisioned this way to guarantee ongoing improvement in the Ventura County community, and those who helped to make that vision a reality.